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Twenty five years after Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen was released, DC has decided to produce Before Watchmen, a set of linked prequels to the classic 12-part series, prompting annoyance from Moore.

“It’s our responsibility as publishers to find new ways to keep all of our characters relevant,” DC Entertainment Co-Publishers Dan DiDio and Jim Lee explained. “After twenty five years, the Watchmen are classic characters whose time has come for new storiesto be told. We sought out the best writers and artists in the industry to build on the complex mythology of the original.”

Alan Moore told The New York Times that  “I tend to take this latest development as a kind of eager confirmation that they are still apparently dependent on ideas that I had 25 years ago,” adding that he didn’t want money:  “What I want is for this not to happen.”

Dave Gibbons’ comment was included in the official press release: “The original series of Watchmen is the complete story that Alan Moore and I wanted to tell. However, I appreciate DC’s reasons for this initiative and the wish of the artists and writers involved to pay tribute to our work. May these new additions have the success they desire.”

Comics writer Peter David pointed out in an interview quoted by Newsarama that Moore’s complaint that there were no prequels or sequels to Moby Dick “is odd considering he took characters created by Jules Verne and Bram Stoker and turned them into superheroes [in The Extraordinary League of Gentlemen] and transformed beloved literary heroines into subjects of erotica [in Lost Girls]… The fact that Moore is so vehemently opposed to the other authors working upon his characters – characters that are pastiches of Charlton Comics creators – might tell you something about how L. Frank Baum would likely have reacted to Moore’s handling of Dorothy.”

Babylon 5 and Rising Stars creator J. Michael Straczynski, writing two of the books, told The Hollywood Reporter, “I think one loses a little of the moral high ground to say, ‘I can write characters created by Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, Robert Louis Stevenson, Arthur Conan Doyle and Frank Baum, but it’s wrong for anyone else to write my characters.'”

Talking to Comic Book Resources, Straczynski also pointed out the reverence with which the various writers and artists approached the project. “Every writer and editor on this project is a massive fan of the original book, and of Alan’s work. As the months passed, we e-mailed each other with the smallest question of continuity, determined to be excruciatingly faithful to the original book because we know what’s at stake. We want to add to, not subtract from, the quality of what Alan and Dave created. We know we have a hell of a legacy to live up to, and we’re determined to achieve that.”

The new stories are:

Rorschach (4 issues) – Writer: Brian Azzarello. Artist: Lee Bermejo

Minutemen (6 issues) – Writer/Artist: Darwyn Cooke

Comedian (6 issues) – Writer: Brian Azzarello. Artist: J.G. Jones

Dr. Manhattan (4 issues) – Writer: J. Michael Straczynski. Artist: Adam Hughes

Nite Owl (4 issues) – Writer: J. Michael Straczynski. Artists: Andy and Joe Kubert

Ozymandias (6 issues) – Writer: Len Wein. Artist: Jae Lee

Silk Spectre (4 issues) – Writer: Darwyn Cooke. Artist: Amanda Conner

Each issue will also contain a two-page back up story, Curse of the Crimson Corsair, by Len Wein and John Higgins, and the series will be concluded with the single-issue Before Watchmen: Epilogue.